How many people read the full text of research papers? (7)

13 July, 2025

Dear sirs

One has to differentiate between guidelines, standards, patents, etc and journal articles.

Authors use “publish or perish” as their motive. The very little reading is done by junior researchers who look for background to their papers. The so-called “citation analysis” are only statistics and they are not an indication for reading a paper.

The paper that are produced and read by many many many are those produced by private companies to achieve financial gains. To prove the point one has to ask how many papers are published by say Microsoft, Google, the old CDC, Lockheed, Samsung, Philips, Apple, etc. staff. Why does the Institute of Physics “run away” from formal publishing (none sense submission, decisions by incompetent editorial board, peer reviewing, waiting, publishing)?

Many issues surrounding not reading the journal articles. Among these are information overload, time constraints, relevance, access barriers (HIFA is doing its best to overcome this) and format and Style. There are other reasons that limit reading a paper such as the availability of alternative sources including open source, social media, conferences, etc. With kind regards.

Najeeb Al-Shorbaji, PhD, FIAHS

Mobile: +962 799391604

Tel.: +962 (6) 5240273

Website: www.shorbaji.net

Director, Knowledge, Ethics and Research @ WHO/HQ (Retired)

President, eHealth Development Association, Jordan

Visiting Professor, Ain Shams University, Egypt

Lecturer/Researcher @ Peter L. Reichertz Institute for Medical Informatics (PLRI), Germany

Emeritus Fellow, AHRO University, Glasgow UK

Member of the International Academy of Public Health Scientific Council @ EMPHNet

Editorial Board Member, Arab Board Medical Journal

Editorial Board Member, Frontiers in Digital Health, Health Communications and Behaviour Change

ORCID ID 0000-0003-3843-8430

HIFA profile: Najeeb Al-Shorbaji recently retired from the World Health Organization (WHO), where he has worked since 1988 in different capacities. He was most recently Director of the Knowledge, Ethics and Research Department at WHO headquarters, Geneva. Previously he was Coordinator for Knowledge Management and Sharing in EMRO (Eastern Mediterranean Regional Office), Egypt. He is a member of a number of national and international professional societies and associations specialised in information management and health informatics. He has authored over 100 research papers and articles presented in various conferences and published in professional journals. He is also a member of the HIFA steering group. Email: shorbajin AT gmail.com https://www.hifa.org/support/members/najeeb